


my heart like a warning siren

by ourviolentends



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Hogwarts, Alternate Universe - Quidditch, And then for Shiro, Fluff, Getting Together, Getting to Know Each Other, Gryffindor Keith (Voltron), Gryffindor Lance (Voltron), Hufflepuff Hunk (Voltron), Hufflepuff Shiro (Voltron), Keith has a crush, Keith has one (1) braincell and it's for Quidditch, Lance is loud, M/M, Meet-Cute, Sheithlentines 2019, Slytherin Pidge | Katie Holt, Tooth-Rotting Fluff, shiro is a sweetheart, they're really competitive
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-24
Updated: 2019-02-24
Packaged: 2019-11-05 04:58:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,961
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17912438
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ourviolentends/pseuds/ourviolentends
Summary: They meet in Keith’s fifth year and Shiro’s sixth under the warm sun of a Saturday Quidditch match.As always, it goes from there.And of course he notices the way Shirogane flies around the Hufflepuff posts with dexterity not common in a Chaser, much less a Keeper. Of course he notices his smile and the way he seems to read the other team’s plays before they even get into formation, how he gets the Quaffle back every time. How could he not notice the best player in the field?Lance says he’s got a crush. Keith says he just has eyes.





	my heart like a warning siren

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ibupony](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ibupony/gifts).



> Finally! I'm so sorry for the delay, adult life has been hell, but it's finally finished. This is a gift for Ibu, a really belated Valentine's day gift. I love Hufflepuff Shiro and Gryffindor Keith, so I loved your prompt! I hope you like what I did with it :)
> 
> This was such a challenge, because I'm used to writing much more introspective/angsty things, but it was really nice to get out of my comfort zone for my boys. They're so in love it's disgusting.
> 
> My eternal thanks to my beta, Yuriy, who corrected my dumb mistakes and made this overall easier to read. I love you so much, sweetheart.
> 
> Title is from [this](http://backshelfpoet.tumblr.com/post/169403056228/january) poem by d.a.s.
> 
> Enjoy!

They meet in Keith’s fifth year and Shiro’s sixth under the warm sun of a Saturday Quidditch match.

Keith knows far too much already about Takashi Shirogane because everyone does, really. Tall, built like a brick shithouse, black short hair with a white fluff on the front that would look ridiculous on anyone else but not on him. He has even learned to spot him along the hallways by the amount of fans squealing in the vicinity –more than once Madam Dayak had to shoo him out of the library hitting him with her wand to stop him from _perturbing the sacred silence of this temple of knowledge–_ , and usually he tries to avoid him as much as possible. _Shiro_ is, after all, everything Keith’s not –sweet, kind, brilliant, popular, loved– and not _once_ has he had the need to stand in his way.

Not _once_ , except _every_ Quidditch season since he got into Hogwarts, when Keith takes a front seat in the Gryffindor stands to watch with a feral smile and envy in his guts every game. And of course he notices the way Shirogane flies around the Hufflepuff posts with dexterity not common in a Chaser, much less a Keeper. Of course he notices his smile and the way he seems to read the other team’s plays before they even get into formation, how he gets the Quaffle back every time. How could he _not_ notice the best player in the field?

Lance says he’s got a crush. Keith says he just has _eyes_.

But none of that matters in this moment, because Keith is no longer stranded in the stands watching, but holding an old and battered second-hand broom in his hands, feeling it vibrate underneath him while he flies around the pitch, doing some warm-up laps before the match starts. It’s only his second match as an official Gryffindor Chaser, but Keith’s not nervous. His skin is tingling and there’s something moving around in his stomach, but he knows what it is: excitement. Flying just _makes sense_ , more than most of the things in his life do.

They gather around Madam Trigel, the referee, and listen to the cautionary speech she gives before she blows her whistle and throws the Quaffle up in the air. When she does, Keith launches himself forward and gets it before some of the players even begin to move; he’s at Hufflepuff’s goal posts in a flash and scoring the first ten points to Gryffindor without stopping to even check on his other teammates.

He smirks when he notices the round eyes and gaping mouth Shirogane sports, still looking at him like an apparition. The Keeper locks eyes with him for a moment and then closes his mouth with a loud click. Keith gets a deep breath in, waiting for the moment those gentle gray eyes turn sour and resentful, but that moment never comes. Instead, they get sharp and focused, and the corner of Shirogane’s lips turn upwards.

Keith lets his breath out and licks his lips. Takashi Shirogane smiles like a challenge.

Someone hits him on the back of his head, hard.

“Stop flirting, show-off, and get back in formation!” Lance shouts, distracting him enough that he tears his eyes from Shirogane and frowns at his fellow Chaser.

“You’re just sore you owe me five galleons because you couldn’t score first,” he shrugs, flying again to the center of the pitch and ignoring Lance’s indignant spluttering.

The team’s captain, a seventh year called Ulaz, looks at him with an eyebrow raised from his place at the center of the field and Keith has the good sense to feel embarrassed. Being called show-off by Lance is one thing –the guy had stated he was Keith’s rival since the moment they were both put in the same house at the tender age of eleven–, but Ulaz has tried to drill teamwork into his skull since the moment he took a chance making him a regular, so Keith knows he should behave.

And truly, it’s not like he doesn’t _try_. He does, he’s memorized every play and move they’ve practiced, but there’s a moment while he flies where everything just disappears and the only thing left is his broom and his instinct. It’s the freest Keith’s ever felt.

Ulaz brings his broom near him before the next play starts and just looks at him with pensive eyes.

“Perhaps this will be a good match for you.” It’s the only thing he says, and Keith looks up at him, confused. He feels good; it will probably be a good match. He doubts he will start dropping the Quaffle any time soon.

It’s not until they’re twenty minutes into the game that Keith realizes the true meaning of Ulaz’s words.

“Dammit!” He turns around and stares in disbelief at Shirogane’s smiling face, glistening with some sweat from the midday sun, holding the Quaffle with ease even after Keith went through the trouble of doing an incredibly difficult faint.

“You’re really good, Kogane! That faint almost got me.” Shirogane’s voice is excited as it carries across the air, but Keith can definitely hear the undertone of teasing there. Bastard. “But maybe you should slow down a bit.”

Keith feels his ears flush and turns around to make it back to his team, where everyone looks at the exchange with several degrees of amusement. Thace, one of the beaters, even has the audacity to chuckle when Keith passes by his side, a murderous aura around him.

“Well, you did score one time against him, that _is_ a feat, you know?” Someone says, and Keith almost snarls.

Shirogane thinks he should slow down? He’ll give him slowing down.

Fifteen minutes later, Shirogane is still smiling that annoying smile of his and Gryffindor is still stagnant at 10 points. He’s not the only one getting antsy, both Lance and Regris are looking at the Hufflepuff Keeper like they want nothing more but throw him off his broom every time he stops one of their shots. Keith agrees. Wholeheartedly.

“Really, you should slow down,” Shirogane repeats while he gives the Quaffle to one of his Chasers. Keith should really, really go back to a defensive position, but instead he looks at the man dressed in canary yellow with incredulity.

“Yeah, so I make it easier for you?” he asks, voice hard. The older boy laughs and it’s a beautiful sound, but Keith is definitely not in the right state of mind to appreciate it. Much.

“Actually, quite the opposite,” he answers, looking at Keith in the eyes, and they seem much more serious than his smile would suggest. “Your flight is absolutely amazing, but being that agile means you don’t put much thought on _where_ you’re putting the Quaffle, and that makes it easy for me to counter it.”

Keith opens his mouth and then closes it several times, ignoring Lance’s screams from the other side of the pitch to _stop picking fights, goddamit, and come back here_.

“Are you calling me predictable?” Shirogane is suddenly just a few feet away, and Keith is not aware of the referee getting closer, whistle in hand.

The Hufflepuff shrugs.

“I guess I am,” he says, and the challenge in his eyes is one Keith cannot let go. He squints at him and clenches his jaw before turning around and flying to his team.

When he gets back to the Gryffindor side of the pitch, Lance is trying to shout his ear off, but one look from Ulaz shuts him off for good. Keith doesn’t look murderous anymore, although his shoulders are tense as a bow. Ulaz thinks that’s a good thing.

“I want to try a Porskoff Ploy.”

Or maybe not. He needs to ask for a time-out, because if Lance’s eyes get any bigger they’re going to fall from their sockets.

“YOU WHAT?!” he screams, and even Regris is looking at him like there’s a bowtruckle coming out of his ear. “Mullet. My man. Did you hit your head? Has your crush with Golden Boy over there made you ABSOLUTELY INSANE?” Keith frowns in concentration more than annoyance, and that’s the only thing that makes Lance stop shouting and start listening for a moment.

“We need something to catch him unguarded,” Keith argues.

“Do you even know what the Porskoff Ploy means?” Lance asks, loudly again, even if he is not more than three feet away from everyone else. “One of us would have to play decoy until he’s got every Hufflepuff Chaser up his ass, and then just casually drop the Quaffle, hoping you will catch it? I mean, man, I know I’m world-class material, but–”

“So you can’t do it?” Keith interrupts, looking far more serious than a school match probably deserves. Lance gapes like a fish a couple of times.

“Can’t I– unbelievable, _of course I can!_ ” Lance screeches.

“Then do it.” Keith’s voice leaves not room for argument, and when Lance turns to Ulaz for backup, the Gryffindor Captain just nods.

“It’s not like our other plays are succeeding anyway,” is the only thing he says, bouncing his Beater bat on his right leg before flying off to signal the end of their time-out. Lance makes a very undignified noise at that.

“Fine. Fine! But I will not be to blame when all this crashes and burns!” he exclaims before getting into position, while Keith rolls his eyes.

To be fair, it is _not_ Lance’s fault. He drops the Quaffle in a good moment, near the goal area, and distracts the Hufflepuff Chasers enough with his screams for Keith to find it easy to appear out of nowhere and shoot directly to the goal post. The throw feels good, the whole play has been flawless, but the Quaffle is still in Shiro’s hands at the end of it.

Even he seems to be a bit surprised by it, to be honest.

“That was… amazing, Kogane,” says the Hufflepuff, his eyes round and his smile wide, and Keith clenches his jaw until it hurts, because he seems absolutely honest. Now he can’t even resent the Keeper, he is so genuinely talented and _nice_.

“Not amazing enough,” he answers bitterly, and turns around.

  


 

 

In the end, it is a Gryffindor win, thanks to Acxa getting the snitch to stop all of them from killing each other. The Hufflepuff Chasers are good, but not good enough to score more than 160 points against a team like Gryffindor. Keith is suddenly back at his routine of dozing off in classes, eating meals sandwiched between Lance and Hunk –and sometimes Pidge, when she convinces Lance to _stop acting like a prejudiced idiot and just come to the Slytherin table to eat with me_ –, either on the Gryffindor or Hufflepuff table, and training until he almost passes out. Ulaz didn’t blame their offensive nullity on him, but something itches underneath Keith’s skin that makes it hard not to do it himself.

“Let’s stop for today,” says Ulaz when the weather gets too intolerable to stand it. The light rain is not a problem, but the wind is, and everyone is cold to the bone. Only Keith hesitates above his broom rather than jump at the opportunity of getting into a hot shower and rest, approaching Ulaz instead and telling him he will stay and practice his dives.

The captain looks at him with his usual stoic face, almost making him squirm.

“You’ll be no good to the team if you get sick, Kogane,” he says, but turns around and drags the team back into the dressers, leaving him there without another word. Keith takes that as permission and turns back to the center of the pitch.

His clothes are baggy and heavy and his hair gets into his eyes, but the vibration of his broom is the only thing he can really feel as he goes higher and higher, plastered against the broomstick to cut the wind around him. At one moment, he shifts his grip and turns the broom around to the ground, feeling the spike of adrenaline as the ground gets closer and closer. At the last possible moment, he takes his broom and pulls it up.

“You really like pulling stunts, don’t you?”

Keith almost falls from his broom when he hears Takashi Shirogane shouting from the edge of the field. He stops midair, looking at the Hufflepuff Captain. He’s in running gear instead of his usual pristine robes, and thankfully there’s no procession of fans following him this time. They wouldn’t brave the weather, even for Shirogane, Keith supposes.

“What are you doing here?” he shouts back, and he thinks he can see the other boy’s shrug and smile.

“I was running,” he answers. Keith flies slowly to the edge of the pitch, looking at him with an eyebrow raised. “That was really impressive, by the way.”

He drops to the ground with a fluid movement but stays some feet away from the Keeper.

“I was just practicing my dives,” he mumbles, awkward. He has never been good at taking compliments –not that there were ever lots of them–, and Shirogane seems to gift them too freely. He wonders for a moment if he’s like that with everyone else, and almost kicks himself. Of course he is. That’s why half of Hogwarts is in love with him.

“That was _just_ practice?” The other boy jokes, whistling long and low, evidently impressed. Keith feels a light blush that hopefully will be confused with the cold. “You are really something.”

Keith shrugs, even more awkward than a second ago.

“Yeah, well, I had to be good at something.”

He doesn’t know why he said it, wanting to take back his words the moment they leave his mouth. Now there’s definitely not a chance in Hell to hide his blush, so he just walks quickly to the dressers, feeling the need to run but not wanting to be even more pathetic than what he already is. He is thinking about how he can drown in the showers when a strong hand stops him by the elbow and makes him turn.

“Hey, Keith… Keith, right?” He nods, looking at the other boy with a nervous frown. “I think I’m a bit antsy, do you wanna practice some shots?”

Keith is dumbfounded.

“What?” It’s the only thing he can say. Shiro seems sheepish all of the sudden, scratching the back of his neck in a nervous way that shouldn’t be that cute in a boy his size.

“I mean, I don’t have my broom with me, but I could take one of those?” He signals at the battered school broom shed. Keith’s brain is still not functioning. “Oh, but– I mean, if you already have other plans, I–”

“No!” There’s some desperation in his own voice that Keith doesn’t like, but really, who would pass on the opportunity to play one-on-one against the best Quidditch Keeper Hogwarts has seen in _decades_? Not him, that’s for sure. “No, it’s– it’s fine, we can do some shots.”

Shirogane smiles wide and open and Keith has to avert his gaze while Shiro goes retrieve a broom and uses his captain privileges to borrow a Quaffle to play with. Keith only allows himself to look back at him when they’re both in the air and Shiro is doing some warm-up. He doesn’t have gloves or any kind of protection, while Keith is in full uniform. Keith thinks he has to make it light.

Twenty minutes later, the word _light_ has disappeared from his vocabulary.

“I just don’t get it!” he shouts, looking at the Hufflepuff with a frustrated frown. “How do you know where I’m sending the Quaffle?!”

Shirogane turns the red ball between his hands –and wow, he can fly with no hands in the broom, _that’s_ impressive– and chuckles.

“What I told you on our game was true, you know?” he begins when Keith huffs at his amusement. “You are the fastest player I’ve ever played with, maybe even seen, but your speed does not hide all the tells you have while throwing a shot. I can read from a million miles away where you are going to put the Quaffle, I just have to get there before you do.”

Keith clenches his fists but nods.

“And how do I...” He doesn’t finish the question, because it’s not necessary. Shirogane sighs.

“Patience.” Keith raises an eyebrow.

“Patience,” he repeats, incredulously. Shirogane smiles one of those enervating smiles of his and shrugs.

“Yes. Stop for a minute and _think_.” Keith hadn’t noticed how close Shirogane was getting, but now he’s two feet away and there’s nothing else he can focus on. “Patience yields focus.” It resonates inside Keith’s chest and mind, and he has to fly backwards to get a grip of his ridiculous thoughts.

“I– I’ll try to remind that,” he answers, tripping over his words in his attempt to remain nonchalant. Shirogane nods and looks at the darkening skies above them.

“I don’t think we will be able to keep practicing, we better get back to the castle.” Keith nods and flies to the ground. The Hufflepuff drops from his broom and walks beside him in silence. Keith expected it to be stiff and awkward, but instead it is companionable and easy. They both put their brooms back in the school shed, and Shiro doesn’t ask why he uses one of those instead of buying his own.

He does ask something while they’re both walking up the path to the castle in the dark twilight.

“So what year are you in?”

Keith looks at him from the corner of his eye.

“Fifth,” he answers, and hears Shirogane hum.

“How come you fly like that and you weren’t in the Gryffindor team before now?” The question is innocent enough, but it makes Keith tense up like a bow. He thinks about not answering, about just turning to the stairs now that they’re already reaching the castle, about ignoring Shirogane and the question and the shame that still comes with things like that. He does none of those things.

“The captain before Ulaz thought I would be… a liability,” he answers, not looking at him, keeping his head straight. “Too many fights, I guess; I spent lots of weekends in detention. He didn’t want to risk having a troublemaker Chaser, he didn’t think it was worth it.” He tries to make it light, but fails by about a mile. “Anyway, he was ri–”

“I’m glad you didn’t give up, that way I got to play against you.” Shirogane interrupts him before he finishes, looking at him and putting a warm hand on his shoulder –and they just spent an hour in the rain, he should be freezing, how is he so warm. So sincere. Like he actually enjoyed playing against Keith.

His heart skips a beat, and it’s the weirdest sensation; it makes him jump back, looking at the stairs like he wants nothing more but disappear in that very moment.

“I– well, me too? Nice practice. And game. And, you know. Thanks,” he mumbles, crossing his arms while walking backwards and then turning around to quickly hop the stairs two on two.

  


  


It becomes a routine, of a sort. Keith stays after every practice until the Hufflepuff Captain gets to the pitch in his afternoon run; he always takes one of the school brooms and casually joins Keith up in the air, and he notices every time how he is conspicuously alone, without the giggling horde behind him he usually has. Keith doesn’t know why it gives him such a great sense of satisfaction. It’s easy for a while, just their brooms in the air and the Quaffle between them. Keith improves quickly, honing the subtle technicalities he had pushed aside in favor of instinct and lightning speed: the hold of the broom, the line of his back while throwing, the balance of his legs to stop midair before releasing the Quaffle. Keith becomes a deadly thing in the air, but he knows he still has leaps to go before catching up with Shirogane. He welcomes the challenge, and it has nothing to do with the warmth inside his chest that blooms every time he congratulates him on a good shot. Nothing.

They become friends, Keith thinks. He starts calling him Shiro after three weeks of the Hufflepuff insisting, and in return Shiro brings him Honeydukes candies from the last Hogsmade weekend and never mentions Keith’s lack of money or broom or tact. Keith knows the awkward look of people trying to avoid those subjects like the plague, but with Shiro it feels like he genuinely just won’t bother with them. Keith feels himself growing comfortable and smiling more, laughing easier and having less of the urge to run away.

He keeps quiet about their friendship, more because he is still not actually sure of where they stand than anything else. He likes having Shiro to himself, without all the nosy questions everyone would surely ask, but there’s also the lingering doubt that lives inside his skin and makes him wonder. Like always, Shiro beats him to it swiftly, casually waving at him from the Ravenclaw table –where he sometimes eats his meals, squished between Matthew Holt and Allura Altea– one evening from across the Great Hall when they happen to coincide, and then going back to his food like it was nothing, shoving Matt aside and joking. Keith is frozen still by sheer shock, but suddenly he _knows_ he has to get out of there, before–

“MULLET, WAS THAT TAKASHI SHIROGANE WAVING AT YOU?”

Too slow. He mourns the death of his escape opportunity in silence and ignores Lance’s shrieks, sitting at the Gryffindor table with his back to Shiro and debating between steak and stew for dinner.

“That was definitely Takashi Shirogane waving at you,” says Hunk with a wondering voice while he sits to his right. Lance doesn’t miss the opportunity and sits to his left, invading his personal space without an ounce of shame. Keith almost bristles but keeps his mouth shut except to eat, and looks stubbornly at his plate instead of his friends' faces.

“Do you mean to tell me you are friends with the most popular wizard in the whole castle and you kept it quiet?!” Lance shouts, and Keith shoves him aside with a grunt.

“Will you stop it?” he hisses, using all of his willpower to not look at the Ravenclaw table. Lance takes that as confirmation and makes a theatrical gesture of pain.

“Oh, the betrayal!” he moans. Hunk rolls his eyes and then turns around to greet Pidge, who is just arriving from her advanced Transfigurations class.

“Why is he shrieking now?” she asks tiredly, sitting next to Hunk and taking a piece of bread without even saying hello. Keith doesn’t answer. He just wants to eat in peace. And quiet. Preferably with Lance fifty miles away.

“Shiro waved at Keith when we got here, so we’re wondering since when they’re _acquainted_ ,” Hunk explains placidly, but Keith doesn’t miss the undertone of teasing his voice has. He needs better friends.

“I hate you all,” he says without looking away from his food.

“Oh, that’s it?” Pidge asks, looking at them with a disappointed raised eyebrow. Lance gasps.

“That’s it? _That’s it_? Pidge, do you even know what we’re talking about here? This is cosmic! Cataclysmic! Why and how did they ev–”

“I thought everybody knew,” Pidge continues, munching on his bread while she serves some steak into her plate and steals a baby corn from Hunk’s one. “I mean, Matt’s been complaining for weeks about how all Shiro talks about lately is Keith.”

There’s a thick silence around them as they all look at Pidge. Keith’s mind is trapped in a loop of her words where he is trying to put them in an order where they actually make sense. She looks back, chewing, and shrugs.

“Didn’t know it was a secret, lover boy,” she says, and Keith feels his cheeks heating up violently.

“It’s not a secret and it’s not _like that_ ,” he hisses. Pidge half-smiles and shrugs again.

“Sure seems like it,” she answers, and Keith just stands up and leaves the Great Hall, dinner be damned. He catches Shiro’s surprised face at his sudden outburst and walks quicker.

He really needs better friends.

  


  


In the next months, there are times where the weather won’t allow anything on the air without the very real and frightening possibility of death, so it’s the perfect excuse for Keith and Shiro to start meeting in other places. Sometimes it’s the kitchens –which Shiro tries to show to Keith while he just snorts and tells him he’s been stealing food from them since he was a first-year–, sometimes it’s the astronomy tower –and those times are usually Keith’s favorites, nothing else but them and the stars above–. This time, Keith received a note from Atlas, Shiro’s beautiful white barn owl, asking him if he had time to go save Shiro from his binge study in the library for Professor Slav’s final.

“I didn’t think you would use me as entertainment, Shirogane,” he whispers, careful of Madam Dayak, with a side smile as he slides out the chair in front of Shiro, who is sprawled above his books and looks like he got dragged 50 yards by a horse.

“I just need to talk to someone so my brain doesn’t melt in the next hour,” Shiro murmurs with a groan that makes Keith kind of uncomfortable in an unexpected way. He coughs and shifts his gaze to the window. There are some dark clouds approaching the castle, and Keith hopes they don’t stay until the weekend. Their game against Ravenclaw will be messy if they do.

Not that they have much chance to win the cup now, he thinks, sully, remembering the crushing Slytherin defeat in the hands of the Hufflepuffs. Pidge had been furious for weeks after La-Sai, Hufflepuff’s Seeker, had caught the Snitch before her. In the end, with an overall difference of more than 250 points in the Inter-House chart, there was no chance in hell to catch up. Hufflepuff would take the Quidditch Cup for the third year in a row.

“That’s what happens when you leave studying to the last possible second,” Keith says, taking out his own books and spreading some parchment to begin his essay on venomous flowers. Herbology is not his best subject, but it’s interesting enough to keep his attention, especially since there is plenty to do with his hands.

Shiro opens one eye and looks at him with an offended frown.

“I did not,” he exclaims in the loudest voice he can without risking being shooed off by Madam Dayak, which was not exactly much. “It’s just… Arithmancy is hard on its own, but Slav’s class is just a thing of nightmares.” If Keith didn’t know better, he would say that was a whimper.

“He can’t be that bad,” he murmurs in response, thinking about a good strategy to tackle his essay. He looks up at Shiro, who has finally raised his head and is looking at him with a little smile, and he feels himself flush slightly.

“What?” he asks gruffly, because his chest feels weird. Shiro shakes his head gently, but his smile doesn’t falter.

“What are you working on?” he asks instead, and Keith bites his lip.

“Herbology, venomous flowers,” he answers, and Shiro hums. “Professor Holt wants at least forty centimeters on them, and I have not even an idea of how to start.” There it is, that hum again. Keith knows enough about Shiro by now to know it means something. “How about you help me with that?”

Shiro’s eyes open with surprise, and Keith thinks _gotcha._

“Um, I don’t think–”

“You’re a sixth year, aren’t you? You should know this like the back of your hand,” Keith teases, and he delights in the way Shiro’s ears get a bit red.

“I mean, I– well, there’s a reason Coleen– professor Holt didn’t let me near the greenhouses without supervision, you know?” Shiro is scratching the back of his neck and not looking at Keith in the eye, embarrassed. “I don’t have what you would call… a green thumb? I mean, I get theory all right, I can help you with that, but I guess she wants you to report on the work you’ve been doing and if I touch that–”

Keith snorts inelegantly and has to suppress his laughter, interrupting Shiro’s rambling.

“How is that possible? Everyone thinks you’re amazing at everything!” he whispers conspiratorially, leaning near the older boy. Shiro rolls his eyes and laughs quietly.

“You shouldn’t believe all you hear from others, should you?” he reprimands without any heat, and then shrugs. “I– well, you can say I was crying tears of joy when I could ditch Herbology this year, I was finally free of that torture.”

Keith snorts again, and this time Madam Dayak does send him a look along with a strong _shhhhh_ that makes him want to snort harder. He doesn’t, but just barely. Shiro makes a little ball with spare parchment and hits Keith square in the face with it, and the other boy does laugh at that.

“Get back to work, mister-green-thumb,” he orders jokingly, and Shiro sighs but nods. He has to work on these problems or Slav will have his head.

Half an hour later, Shiro’s brain is mushy and Keith’s still at square zero. They rise their eyes at the same time and laugh again, trying to be quiet, which leads to even more laughter. Keith can’t place the feeling in his chest, but he doesn’t hate it. He can’t hate anything that comes from Shiro, it seems.

“Hey, so where are you spending the summer vacations?” Shiro asks suddenly, his gray eyes firmly locked into Keith’s. The Gryffindor’s laughter dies in his lips and he licks them, tasting the beginning of a sour emotion crawling through his throat.

“Well, I'll get back to the home, I guess,” he answers, looking at the table in the last moment.

“ _The_ home?” Shiro asks quietly, and Keith sighs.

“Yeah. The orphanage.” Shiro nods, as if he understands, and Keith is relieved for the lack of questions. He hates feeling someone pities him and he hates how the mood suddenly plummets every time he mentions it, in any circumstance.

Shiro is drumming his fingers against his thighs, a clear sign of his anxiousness, and Keith hates it too.

“You could always spend it at my house?”

Of all the things Keith expected to leave Shiro’s mouth, that was not one of them. He gapes for a bit, not knowing what to say. He has been invited to Lance’s and Hunk’s –and even Pidge’s– homes for the summer, but those invitations never felt as this. Oh, how he wants it, how he wants to get to know Shiro’s home, his daily routine away from Hogwarts’ walls and the little details about his life and his relationships that conformed him as he is. It makes him smile, and then laugh, and Shiro just looks confused about his reaction, which makes him laugh even harder.

“I don’t think the home would be too pleased about that,” he answers finally, imagining the stern matron’s face if he asks her for permission to spend the summer in Shiro’s house.

Although, he thinks a moment later, maybe she wouldn’t object. It’d be one less problem child to take care of, after all.

“Then I will write.” Shiro interrupts his thoughts, smiling that smile of his and making Keith’s breath leave his lungs. “They won’t object to Atlas visiting sometimes, will they?”

Keith thinks the matron will probably have some things to say about a ginormous barn owl visiting Keith every other morning, but he doesn’t care. He doesn’t care, because that is the moment, with Shiro being a mess and smiling, in which Keith puts a name to the warm feeling in his chest that extends to the tips of his toes. He wonders, quietly, how is he going to survive being in love with Takashi Shirogane.

  


  


Summer comes and goes between letters with Shiro and his friends and the usual dull activities at the orphanage. The end of it is marked by something he wasn’t expecting in a million years, but which leaves him with something heavy in his stomach for weeks.

“Gryffindor captain?!”

Keith grunts while Lance exclaims, having seen his badge in his trunk upon arriving to the dormitories that night. The lankier boy scrambles to get the badge between his hands, smiling at it like a madman, but then remembering it’s not _his_ and making a sour face.

“And how come you got it, Mullet, huh? With your people skills?” he asks with a frown and Keith wants to tell him he has no clue, tell him he wonders himself, but the words get stuck in his throat. He shrugs, instead, and Lance rolls his eyes. “Figures, you’re on the team _one year_ and Ulaz and Kolivan just–”

Keith stands up from the edge of his bed and looks at Lance, who seems to notice he fucked up, because he stops talking mid-sentence and stares at him with round eyes.

Keith loves his friend, he really does. He was the first one he made after getting to Hogwarts, after discovering half his heritage was something unknown and amazing, after being alone for years. Lance had just approached him at eleven years old in those same dormitories and decided they were destined rivals and therefore needed to be as close as they could. He had been the one to introduce him to Hunk, the next morning at the Hufflepuff table, and Keith was grateful for it. Even if they were insufferable, they _were_ his first friends in this new world, even before Pidge, and do have his back every time.

He loves Lance for everything he’s done for him, but he sometimes hates him all the same.

“Hey, man, I–”

“Fuck you.” It’s the only thing he says before leaving the dormitory and getting out of the common room. Once outside, he takes a deep breath to try and control his shaking hands, and runs through the castle until he gets to the only place where he can stop thinking and just be: the Astronomy Tower. He goes past the closed door with a simple _Alohomora_ and climbs to the top of the tower to lie on the floor of the observatory deck. He looks at the stars for a long time, shiny things above him, and sometimes pushes the heel of his hands to his eyes with frustration.

It doesn’t surprise him when some time later he hears footsteps approaching carefully, being deliberately loud for him to compose himself if he wants to. Keith doesn’t move, even when Shiro sits down beside him. He can feel the heat he radiates, like a furnace, and once again he wonders how is he always so warm. He doesn’t turn his eyes from the stars to look at him, though, waiting for Shiro to approach the subject first. He never disappoints.

“Lance is looking for you,” Shiro comments after a while, nonchalant. Keith keeps quiet and doesn’t move. “I think he wants to apologize for something.”

At this, Keith just huffs quietly and bites his lip. He will let Lance apologize when they go back. He knows he doesn’t mean it, he knows those were just Lance’s own insecurities talking, but that doesn’t mean it hurt any less to hear his own thoughts said to him.

“He mentioned something about a Quidditch captaincy?” Shiro’s voice is careful, but he can hear the tiny, badly hidden smile in his voice, and Keith sighs. Of course Shiro would be happy about this. Of course.

“It’s probably some kind of mistake,” he reckons, a thought that has crossed his mind lots of times in the couple of weeks since he received the badge. Shiro hums with a disbelieving tone.

“I don’t think Professor Kolivan makes those kind of mistakes,” Shiro ponders, and Keith knows the Gryffindor House Head does not. He knows, but it being a mistake is the only explanation he can think of, the only way this can be the truth, because it’s ridiculous.

Ridiculous. He lets out a short, bitter laugh. How can he be Gryffindor Captain if he’s only played for one year with the team, if he is a certified hot-head, if he focuses more on his own plays than teamwork, if he–

“I shouldn’t even be in Gryffindor,” he murmurs low, very low, and hopes that Shiro doesn’t catch it. But of course Shiro does, because when has anything ever escaped him?

“What do you mean?” Keith is still not looking at him, stubbornly staring at the stars above, but he can hear in his voice the confused frown Shiro surely sports. Keith licks his lips nervously, but there’s something creeping in his veins since the moment the Sorting Hat was placed in his head, and it’s choking him now, even after five years of being a Gryffindor.

“I mean, what part of me even resembles a Gryffindor?” he wonders with a tiny voice. “I’m short-tempered, I grant you that, and I think with my fists, but everything else... And now– now I have to take care of a team, and I know I can’t do that! It just– I’m not like you, Shiro, I’m no leader. Who would follow _me_?”

His voice is shaking, so he shuts up and tries to calm down. It’s stupid. He’s being stupid, he’s been in Gryffindor for five years, and even if he feels like he doesn’t belong _he’s there_. It’s not like he belongs anywhere else, for that matter. He might just as well stay there. He knows that, he knows he shouldn’t complain, but there’s still a discomfort resting inside his bones, and it’s the first time he’s spoken aloud about it.

“Keith, look at me?” Shiro’s voice is careful, but carries an edge to it that Keith doesn’t identify. Keith takes a last deep breath and turns around to face Shiro. He’s probably disappointed. That thought makes his chest hurt ten times more. He never, ever wanted to disappoint Shiro.

When he turns, Shiro is indeed watching him with a frown, but it doesn’t feel heavy. The older boy puts a hand on his shoulder –like he wants to anchor Keith, like he doesn’t know his mere presence keeps Keith straight– and squeezes hard.

“Listen, Keith, I don’t know why you think you don’t belong in Gryffindor, but I have to tell you, you do.” Shiro’s voice is firm but kind, and Keith can’t stop looking at him. “You are loyal, brave and always fight for what you believe in. You never give up, even in the most dire circumstances, and will always look out for others first. How is that not the definition of a lion at heart?” he asks with a soft smile, and the hand that squeezes Keith’s shoulder moves to his cheek.

Shiro gets closer, and Keith can almost feel his breath on his skin. The warm beast inside his chest roars in agreement, because it would be so easy, so incredibly easy, to just lean and join their lips. Instead, Keith drops his head into Shiro’s broad chest and bites his lips. Shiro wraps his arms around him and holds him close.

“I’m really, really proud of you, Keith. You can’t give up on yourself, you’ve endured so much and you’ve grown more than I’ve ever seen anyone grow,” he murmurs into his hair, and Keith closes his eyes. “You’re going to be an amazing captain, I know it.”

And there, with the warm feeling exploding inside his chest, maybe Keith believes it.

  


  


Keith accepts Lance’s weird apologies in the way of new Quidditch gloves –which appear mysteriously on his bed one morning–, and things return to their right order after that: Pidge still complains about Lance’s prejudices about Slytherin every morning, Hunk still follows up in all of her weird potions and transfiguration experiments, and Lance is still as loud as always. Keith is still quiet most of the time, opening his mouth mostly to tease his fellow Gryffindor or eat.

The first months come and go, with the only memorable mention of the weirdest Quidditch trials Keith’s ever seen. Pidge says the weird amount of people in the trials wanting to stand uncomfortably close to him was their way of flirting, because apparently Keith is the “bad boy type”, whatever that means. He knows nothing about that.

Shiro is still a constant in his life, even more so after that first night of the year in the Astronomy Tower. There’s a ginormous pink elephant in the room every time they meet, and people around them have started to complain.

“I mean, maybe you could cook something for him? The way to the heart is through the stomach, isn’t it?” Hunk suggests one evening while they’re in one of the gardens just outside the castle, trying to keep warm from the October chill without having to be actually inside with everyone else. Pidge is making notes for a new potion and Lance is watching some girls by the lake with a dreamy smile, although everyone turns to look at Keith when they hear Hunk’s suggestion.

Keith rolls his eyes and gets his attention back to his Quidditch drill manual, wondering about the plans for next afternoon’s practice. Lance pokes him on the ribs and tries to get an answer from him, but he endures it like a champion.

“Hey, so we’re playing you guys next week, right?” Hunk asks, changing the subject, and Lance stops bothering Keith for a moment.

“Yeah, because Slytherins wussed out,” he answers, and Pidge throws him some grass, frowning.

“Hey! It’s not our fault Lotor is still recovering from an accident this past summer,” she argues, and Lance makes a face at the name.

“Yeah, yeah, he’s recovering all right, making doe eyes at Allura all the time,” he mumbles grumpily, and everyone rolls their eyes at that. “Anyway, are you ready to face your nemesis, Mullet?” he asks slyly, waving his eyebrows at Keith. The other Gryffindor snorts and moves to stand up, cleaning his robes from stray grass.

“He’s not my nemesis, and of course we will be ready,” he answers, walking back to the castle to read in peace. Lance looks at him one more time and then at Pidge and Hunk.

“Absolutely deflecting, I’m telling you,” he states.

  


  


The day of the game is windy, but the sun peaks from the white clouds in the sky, and Keith thinks it will be a good weather for the match. He stands in front of his team, some of them seasoned veterans and some of them playing their first official match, and wonders if he needs to say something. He probably does, he realizes when no one’s eyes leave his face.

“I–,” he starts, and then clears his throat nervously. He thinks about what he would like being said to him, and then sighs. “It’s going to be a hard match,” he starts, gripping his school broom tightly. “But we’ve trained for months and we are good. We can rely on each other; we just have to show that, and we will. So go out there and give it all you’ve got.”

He turns around and leads the way to the pitch, instructing them to make some warm up laps while he talks to Madam Trigel. When he arrives, Shiro is already there, imposing in his canary yellow uniform but with a smile that makes all of Keith’s nerves fly away. They listen to Madam Trigel's speech about fair play and shake hands for maybe longer than necessary.

“Ready, captain?” Shiro asks, smiling jokingly as they fly to their respective teams. Keith rolls his eyes, but there’s a smile in his lips that he cannot hide.

“You’re gonna eat some dust, old timer,” he answers, making a mock salute with two fingers to his brow and turning to his team.

The game plays out more or less like Keith had imagined. Knowing that snatching points away from Shiro is a pain, Keith has instructed them to focus particularly in defense, minimizing the damage their Chasers made. It is working, with Hufflepuff just getting one shot into the Gryffindor goal posts, but it is not a strategy that can work forever. Even right now, everyone is getting antsy; he can notice it in the way their movements get a bit more reckless, less thoughtful.

Keith asks for a time-out after a particularly long struggle for the ball that ended in a foul for Hufflepuff. After the free shot, which Plaxum saves with an amazing dive, they all gather in a circle and look at Keith.

“I know this is hard,” he starts, adjusting his gloves and licking his lips. “And I think we have to make a move on the offense. But it has to be something huge,” he says, and Lance is opening his eyes in surprise even before he finishes.

“Oh, I know that look, you’re trying the Porskoff Ploy again, aren’t you?” he asks, but it isn’t a _no_ like the first time, and Keith counts that as a win. He nods.

“It almost got Shiro the first time, and it will unbalance their defense if it succeeds,” he explains calmly. Lance looks like he’s going to argue, but then he shrugs and sighs.

“I’m in, I mean– I definitely did it perfectly the first time, didn’t I?” Keith ignores him and looks around the team for complaints, but everyone is nodding, and some of the heavy weight in the base of his stomach lifts when he sees that. It feels good to be trusted.

“Then let’s do it,” he says, and signals the end of the time-out.

Lance, again, is the perfect decoy. He is loud and obnoxious on a regular basis, so no one really suspects him, and it catches everyone off-guard when he drops the Quaffle instead of trying to get his shot. Keith appears at the perfect moment to catch it and get past all the defenses light-quick. He can already see Shiro moving, and he takes a deep breath. _Patience yields focus_ , he repeats in his mind, stopping one second, just one, to adjust his posture and choose the most difficult angle for Shiro to get to.

The moment he releases the Quaffle, everything around him goes quiet. The only thing that matters is Shiro in front of him and the Quaffle escaping through his fingers and making a clean arch into one of the goal posts.

Keith is still dumbstruck when he feels strong hands in his arms and notices faintly that Shiro is grabbing him.

“Keith, that– that was amazing!” he is shouting with pride dripping from his voice, but all Keith notices is his hands and their warmth, and the beast inside his chest roars like never before, so Keith does the only thing that makes sense in that moment: he grabs Shiro by the face and kisses him like a hungry man.

By the moment they stop, every person watching the match is screaming like a loon, but none of it matters, because Shiro is holding his cheek and looking at him like he hung the moon up in the sky.

“I’ve wanted to do this since months ago,” Shiro whispers and Keith smiles.

“Then don’t stop,” he answers and kisses him again.

**Author's Note:**

> There's a planned but unwritten epilogue where they are happy and disgustingly in love and Allura, Matt and Lotor get the lines they deserve and I couldn't fit in here. Will it ever be finished? Who knows.
> 
> Meanwhile, I hope you enjoyed. I have a [twitter](https://twitter.com/ourviolentends), if you want to scream with me about these two idiots. Now I'm gonna sleep for twenty hours, thanks.


End file.
